Like it or not, the major news story of the past week is Justin Bieber’s latest round of publicity stunts.

Some say this is a case of too much fame too early, while others see it as a cry for help. Personally, I don’t think Justin Bieber is any more of a twit than anyone else. The twits you and I know are rarely allowed to reach the five-star level of twitdom that Bieber has reached, mainly because they haven’t generated enough cash to fill the Grand Canyon — twice.

Right now, there are twits in our own community who are taking up two parking spaces, cursing in public around children and talking with food in their mouths with little to no chance of international recognition. It doesn’t seem fair that certain twits get to become rich while most twits are relegated to taking 16 minutes to place an order at a drive-through window, followed by asking for 30 packets of ketchup for one hamburger.

For all the unsung twits out there who are currently only able to annoy a handful of people at a time, there is hope. After Justin Bieber’s little traffic dust-up in Florida last week, Christopher Thomas of Halifax News Service reported Bieber’s passenger was a model and former resident of Jacksonville. This prompted me to do a little digging to find out if the Biebster himself had spent any time in ENC.

After several wild goose chases, a farmer in the Bucklesberry section of La Grange stepped forward with information that is sure to draw attention away from actual news for days to come.

“Back in 2006, I got a call from a cousin who lives in Canada,” said Byron McKeeby. “She said she and her 11-year-old son Justin were coming down to North Carolina for the summer. She asked if there was any work on my farm her son, so I asked what he was good at. She said he was good at dancing and singing Ne-Yo songs.”

Although there was little need for Ne-Yo covers in McKeeby’s tobacco field, the farmer decided to give young Justin Bieber a shot.

“We started him off cropping, and it seemed to be going pretty good until we realized he was only getting about one leaf per stalk,” McKeeby said. “We told him he’d need to get four leaves off of every stalk, but he was afraid it would affect his dancing. See, when young people dance these days, they have to be able to grab their britches a lot.

“He didn’t want to risk not being able to grab his britches, so we put him in charge of hooking and unhooking trailers.”

McKeeby said Bieber was obviously not accustomed to farm life, but was very enthusiastic.

Page 2 of 2 - “We got to the end of a row and the trailer behind the harvester was full of tobacco, so I motioned for Justin to come over and unhook it,” McKeeby said. “We all headed over to the truck to get a Nab and a Pepsi, and when we got back we saw that Justin had unhooked the harvester from the tractor.

“He was so proud of himself I didn’t have the heart to tell him he’d done wrong.”

So as to not hurt Bieber’s feelings, McKeeby and his crew called the mules out of retirement to finish the day out without the harvester.

“Bless his heart, Justin spent the next six hours trying to back the harvester and trailer up to the barn door,” McKeeby said. “That night I called Justin’s mama and told her tobacco season had been cancelled due to a twine union strike.”

For the rest of the summer, Bieber worked for a local rental company.

“They dressed him up like the Statue of Liberty to wave in customers,” McKeeby said. “It was a good job for him, and he even got to dance a little bit. I’m pretty sure a lot of those moves he does on stage know were worked out while he was working for the rental place. It was odd seeing the Statue of Liberty grab herself while dancing, but I guess you’ve gotta give the people what they want.”

When asked what he thought of Bieber’s latest round of shenanigans, McKeeby waxed philosophical.

“If he hadn’t become famous, he probably be a ward of the state by now,” McKeeby said while pointing at a barn Bieber destroyed. “So he spit on some fans and endangered the public while drag racing? He’s generating a lot of money for somebody, and whatever percentage of that money that’s not being hidden out of the country can only help the economy.

“Shoot, I might even start grabbing my britches while I dance myself.”

Jon Dawson’s columns appear every Tuesday and Thursday in The Free Press. Contact Jon at 252-559-1092 or jon.dawson@kinston.com. Purchase Jon’s second book “Counterfeit Sauerkraut & The Weekend Teeth” at The Free Press office or jondawson.com.